Elizabeth

by Edgar Allan Poe

Published 1829


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Elizabeth, it surely is most fit 
[Logic and common usage so commanding] 
In thy own book that first thy name be writ, 
Zeno and other sages notwithstanding; 
And I have other reasons for so doing 
Besides my innate love of contradiction; 
Each poet – if a poet – in pursuing 
The muses thro’ their bowers of Truth or Fiction, 
Has studied very little of his part, 
Read nothing, written less – in short’s a fool 
Endued with neither soul, nor sense, nor art, 
Being ignorant of one important rule, 
Employed in even the theses of the school- 
Called – I forget the heathenish Greek name 
[Called anything, its meaning is the same] 
“Always write first things uppermost in the heart.”


Elizabeth,” one of many poems by Edgar Allan Poe, was published in 1829.